By Esther Tung
Vancouver Magazine recently published an article titled “Do Vancouver Men Suck?” that’s gained a bit of traction. Upon first skim, it might have put into words the sinking feeling of many driven, urban, and single women in Vancouver — that they are scaring men off because they are too successful or too smart.
The article is poorly written and dubiously researched. For a supposedly prominent publication, it sure seemed difficult to get a hold of an equal amount of male perspective, and not to mention contrary female opinions on the state of the dating scene. It’s clear that the author had an agenda going into it and was, at the very least, doing some cherry-picking on her quotations.
Inevitably, the article touches on the subject of ‘the rise of women’ on university and career levels, and that it somehow is linked to the fall of the male gender, and excuses men for deteriorating into overgrown children. As inevitably, it includes a successful career woman whose advice to Vancouver’s dating scene is: “Men need to take more risks and women need to shut up.”
Insightful.
Here’s what I would have said if the Vancouver Magazine had interviewed me:
The Vancouver men that those other girls keep talking about probably do exist somewhere. In fact, I’m absolutely sure they do, as I’ve seen them the few times I venture up to bars on the Granville Strip or those “chic Whistler bars” they mention.
But honestly, I don’t really know what they’re talking about. Any time that a meeting has been obviously designed as a ‘date’, my companion has turned up with great style, enthusiasm, respect, and an arsenal of brilliant conversation topics. Who opens my door depends on who gets there first. It’s not as if they actually shrink back from the entrance as we approach it. Whether they carry my extra bags depends on whether it means I wouldn’t have a free hand to hold theirs, and it’s not like they’ve ever turned me down when I asked for help.
I know that because we’re socialized by rom-coms and the evil media to think that those are problematic arrangements, and that we’re not really validated unless he throws his coat over a puddle for you, but really, you’ll never find satisfaction until you learn to leave those expectations behind.
The thing is, even though these ‘babyish’ Vancouver dudes won’t drive an hour to pick you up and drop you off (because they have no car), assume that neither will an intelligent, progressive man who doesn’t make annoying kitchen jokes and wouldn’t say “Fuck you, bitch” to a woman who declines to dance with them after he buys them one tequila shot. (True story.)
At the end of the article, the author does manage of insert a couple of lines from a man, who presents the opinion that both sexes share the blame for the current state of the supposedly dead dating scene, an opinion apparently so outrageous that it had be cut off under the excuse that it was “another story”. But it isn’t! It’s exactly the same story. Vancouver women aren’t dating in a vacuum.
For every one immature Vancouver man, there is another unreceptive and cliquish Vancouver woman. This seems to be a phenomenon that afflicts more ‘mainstream’ venues, like the Cambie or the Met, where even I think twice about making some offhand small talk to the girl next to me at the bar — the odds of getting just a pinched, “Who are you again?” smile are high.
Finding romance at ‘artsy’ locales, I’ve found, has been a lot easier and more fulfilling — I recommend art galleries, music festival campgrounds, afterparties at the Waldorf, and ice cream socials.
